When I just came in here, I was already surprised how small the group is and what intensity this group still has when I just came in. When we finished the opening ceremony yesterday, it suddenly became clear to me that we had started something. And Beate, you also said that yesterday, the group here and the house will be very influenced and already influenced. And I hope the Sangha will also be influenced. And we have started something that cannot be reversed.

[01:01]

I think if we once lived a period of practice or a month of practice here, we will live in it every year. Maybe at some point longer, but at least four weeks. And that has very decisive consequences and changes. I remember Creston, when we finally had the first period of practice, Creston had a different structure. In the last few weeks and in the last few days, I have discovered two treasures here in Johanneshof.

[02:06]

Not so obvious treasures, also not treasures after which one buries, but treasures that are already noticeable. And one treasure is the Sangha. And I would like to share this with you a little bit, how it has been for me in the last few days. And I sat with you yesterday afternoon, I think, and I took the lunch meal with Oyoki, And suddenly I had the feeling that it was a group that had really decided to practice together for four months. And we had been preparing for this for a long time.

[03:11]

And there was a quality there for a moment that I otherwise only knew from the teachings. But the Sesshin quality pushed something a little bit and from seven days and then it's over again. And here a quality has arisen that is softer and deeper and probably that's why it can be kept upright for four weeks. And that moved me very much. And I felt very carried away. And then I started to think about what Sangha means to me and what Sangha in general means.

[04:13]

And traditionally it is of course, the coexistence of monks and lay people to live a certain practice. She gathers around a teacher or a teacher, and my impression is that the longer The older and longer the tradition is after which it is practiced, the greater is the chance that this group also practices deeply and that it also continues to exist. And it is a difference to all other forms of life. like, for example, living together or in a two-person relationship.

[05:23]

It's really about the common practice, and I would like to go into more detail on this in a moment. I studied sociology as a secondary subject during my studies and was always fascinated by these social utopias that were addressed there. And they were all utopias based on the idea that a social change must take place so that we can live happier and more content with each other. As I just said, it fascinated me very much. But it was a utopia in the truest sense of the word, because so many basic conditions had to be changed and so many premises had to be kept in order to get there that it always seemed impossible to me.

[06:25]

And yet I still had and still have my little utopia. And I would call it the utopia of a liberated area. I always had the idea that we should create a space that is free of certain conditions, of certain pressures and necessities. And then I focused less on sociology than on psychology during my studies, because I thought, okay, there might be more to be done than in a large social framework. And so in the last few years I have noticed that I have been following this path quite unintentionally, that I have tried to create my little utopia, namely a place of practice and especially a Sangha.

[07:38]

To be part of a Sangha means more and more to me that we create a liberated area together by develop things that we want to develop together and that we think are right and that make us clear in the long term and perhaps make us happier. It is an attempt, but it is really an attempt that is worth it, especially since we are building on a tradition that has existed for a very long time. Practicing this together now in this group is based on very simple elements. We sit together, that means we are still together, we eat together, we breathe together,

[08:49]

And that shows very clearly. We recite together and are there in one breath, so to speak. And we try to structure the day together. That alone I don't think it is Sangha yet. Sangha needs, I think, some other qualities, because this common living together has also been tried in communities and has failed very, very often. I think another important quality is to take refuge. We recite every time before we eat, we take refuge with the Buddha, we take refuge with the Dharma, and we take refuge with the Sangha.

[10:03]

What does it actually mean to take refuge with the Sangha? When I take the word myself, it means, I could almost say, I flee from something that is not good for me, which may do me better. When I take refuge in this group, I take refuge in each one of you. I hope, when I take refuge, that you will support me. I hope that you support the good in me, that what is worth supporting is in the sense that it helps me and the group, and I hope for more support that you ignore what you do not like, or does not support me, does not give me food and helps me.

[11:21]

And I hope that I can show myself as I am. And this is something that we promise ourselves at least twice a day. And I wish that we just let it become truth or truthful. And my impression is that Sangha is actually one of the most difficult forms of living together. It is more difficult to live in a community, it is more difficult to live in a double relationship, and it is more difficult to live alone. These three so-called forms and other forms in between are the ones that this society offers as possibilities.

[12:24]

But what makes the Sangha so difficult, and we spoke about it a few weeks ago with Senkin, is not only that we want to live together well, we want to live together and change ourselves. And that makes it so difficult. And as Becker-Rosche always says so beautifully, we live together in the Sangha in order to become this or that which we always wanted to become. And that really makes it a big problem. We don't live together because we like each other. It's nice when that's the case. We live together because we want to change together.

[13:25]

And we know that we can only change as individuals with the help of others. Last weekend we had the wedding of Bernd and Verena and I asked them, and this was part of the ritual, I asked them if they were willing to go into a larger being, to the danger that they would endanger their private truths. And this is something that we risk every day in living together in the Sangha.

[14:28]

We endanger our private truths. We endanger our images of ourselves. We endanger our opinions about ourselves and the world. And we endanger our views about our fellow citizens. We are constantly confronted with other truths. And I think that is one element that makes it so difficult. We endanger our little self and are afraid to enter into this greater being, into this greater being. Thich Nhat Hanh has a very beautiful picture for this. He says we are in this society as water drops, separated individuals who live separately from each other.

[15:32]

And what we all wish for is that we put these water drops together in a stream. And this stream carries the individual drops This current will certainly lead to the sea. As a drop of water, there is always the danger that we will evaporate on the way to the sea. But as a current, there is no danger. Pekka Roshi also asked me to talk about life in the moment. And that leads me to the second treasure.

[16:38]

And this second treasure that I have discovered for myself in the last few months, this second treasure is called Gisela. And in the last few weeks she has become a teacher for me, a teacher who keeps me very much in the moment. And before I talk about it, I would like to take a bigger bow and ask the question, we all want to be in the here and now, we all want to be in the moment. And which What does this path offer us?

[17:44]

A lot of what we do goes beyond really stopping at the moment. And very traditionally there are many approaches that I could subsume under the term mindfulness. And I have already talked about it a few times. I just want to mention it again because it is such a large area and there are so many possibilities and we have to decide again and again which gate or which approach we take to be careful. And it is always difficult for me not to jump, to stay on one thing and to really pursue and pursue it to the very bottom.

[18:47]

And we can take many different paths to enter there. One path is of course the body. I am careful about my body. now with regard to my sitting posture, my standing, walking and lying posture. I am careful with regard to my feelings. I have a good feeling, a pleasant feeling, an unpleasant feeling or a neutral feeling. and I am careful about my spirit, my state of mind, for example, I have a desire, but no desire, I hate or I do not hate, or I am confused or I am not confused, and I can direct my attention to the content of the spirit

[20:11]

And then the five skandhas would be a possibility to practice. Or also the five obstacles. And I only mention them because we talked about them a few days ago. I don't know if I can still put them together, but the five obstacles are hate, restlessness, apathy, only four come to mind, and doubt. And I call these mindfulness exercises, because for years I have been one of these areas and tried to practice it as well as possible.

[21:18]

Again and again into the moment, again and again into the present moment. When Gisela found out that she had a tumour, her life and my life changed drastically. It was no longer the question of whether I live in the here and now. Gisela was the living example, or is the living example, of living in the here and now. And she completely ripped me out of this thinking, in the broadest sense of the word. And I had always wished that this process would go slowly and maybe appear later, because it was so drastic and overwhelming that it made me very afraid and I only developed great resistance to look at it at all.

[22:35]

And for me it was the gateway to the here and now, to say that Gisela has not spoken about the future from now on. There were no and there are no conversations about the future, however we have spoken about the future in the past. The farthest you can think of is 24 hours. And that's a lot. And it became clear to me how much I distance myself from here and now and the moment by thinking about the future. I try to be in the here and now with these practices that I mentioned earlier, but they are crossed over again and again, that I make plans.

[23:40]

Plans, what does it look like tonight? Plans, what does it look like tomorrow? Plans, when am I going on vacation? Plans, when am I going to Crestone? as a mockery. These are plans that I can simply forget. It is important to make plans, but they are really empty. And it may sound flat when I say that I don't really know if I will live these plans, But it has never come so close to me that they are really empty. And suddenly I am confronted with the fact that I can make a thousand plans and I still have to look now, now in the moment.

[24:47]

What is in the moment? And this moment gets something quite right. In the papers that Dieter gave us, we are not talking about the absolute and the relative, but about the right and the one-sided. At the moment, there is something right to do, something absolute to do. Often I do the one-sided, what I have always done, what corresponds to my structure. And when the children were there from Nico and Beate, it became so clear to me again. They are absolute. If they are hungry, they are hungry.

[25:47]

They can't get rid of it. When it hurts them, they scream and it is written for so long that it no longer hurts. There is no atonement at all, absolutely no atonement. And I experience something similar with Gisela as my teacher. It is absolutely and rightly When she says, I want to ride a bike today, I want to eat now, I want to sit now. It is not debatable. And the way she says it shows that. No discussion. And it's not something like, that's what I need now, or that's what I wish for, or something like that, but it comes from something very deep, where there is one thing with what she needs, and it has nothing to do with whether she likes it or not.

[27:07]

It has something to do with what is necessary for her at the moment. It's like the need turned towards the, that's what I'm doing now. And that has something very, very clear, of course. But it also has something very frightening, because I am also confronted with it. What do I actually want? And it's not the point, what do I actually want, but what do I need? What is my necessity? What, yes, who am I actually? And it is this mirror that is described in these small writings, the old one that sees itself in the mirror.

[28:21]

And I look at Gisela and see myself and see the mirror and I see Gisela and Often I see this completely clear absolute before me and feel this absolute clear in me and am forced to do the right thing. Yes, I am sorry that I have become a little personal, but I thought I would like to share this with you, because Kisela is part of this Sangha and it is also important to me that her pillow is here and it is nice that it is lying there and that her abhiyukis are there and that she is at least very present for me in this month.

[29:38]

And I would like us to take refuge in the Sangha and take refuge in the absolute moment. Thank you. May our intention be the same for every being.

[30:16]

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